Theo 70% Nutcracker Brittle

3oz (84g) bar
Ingredients: Organic fair trade cocoa beans, oft. sugar, o. corn syrup, oft. cocoa butter, water sea salt, baking soda, o. almonds, o. hazelnuts, o. ground vanilla bean
12g sugar/42g serving (28.6% by wt.)

Corporate Info: (Copied from 12/15/12) I've written about Theo Chocolate many times, and in short, it's a great Seattle company making bean-to-bar chocolate and creative, often seasonal confections (you'll see more in-store than online) that are organic and fair trade. You can visit Theo's retail store, order online, or find a selection of Theo's bars at upscale and health food stores nationwide. My only beef with Theo is that I tend to find its usual 70% dark chocolate base too sour as a match for flavorings, but that's a personal taste issue.

Today's Bar: 70% Nutcracker Brittle, another holiday bar that sounds like a slightly darker, non-milk, nutty version of last week's 62% salted toffee.

Appearance: Actually, compared to last week's, this is exactly what one might think: a little darker, with less white in the color and still a reddish, non-uniform base.

Smell: Really lovely--aromatic and beany/raw but not harsh.

Taste: First, the brittle is totally different from last week's salted butter toffee, more like tiny, crunchy nut pieces with just a hint of candy's crystalline texture. There's also not as much salt, which I think this could have used; the nut flavor is muted compared to the strong, sour and raw flavors of Theo's intense cacao. The most successful bites I get are those with larger brittle pieces, which stand out against the lower proportion of chocolate. 

Conclusion: Theo 70% Nutcracker Brittle is fine, but the nutty brittle's subtler flavors are dwarfed by the intense cacao.

Lake Champlain Five Star Chocolate Bar Fruit & Nut

 

1.9oz (53g) bar

Ingredients: Sugar, cocoa butter, cocoa mass, milk powder, milk fat, soybean lecithin, vanilla, hazelnut paste, pecans, raisins, dried cherries

Corporate Info: I rather like Lake Champlain because it makes my favorite cocoa powder (so far), and because the passionate, creative mind (at least at that time) behind the Five Star Bars is profiled in Candyfreak, a book about a few remaining small businesses in the large-corporation-dominated chocolate world. I'm not sure there's a lot to say about the company otherwise: It's based in Vermont and about 30 years old...not organic or fair trade or whatnot, but if you're in the U.S. you can buy them and support a relatively small American company. (Bonus: Combine a factory tour with a trip to the nearby Ben and Jerry's factory and seriously, that's a good time right there.)

[Update/correction 4/2/12] Lake Champlain does produce a few organic items and is a member of the World Cocoa Foundation, which claims to be working toward various positive aims (focusing on child labor and so on). However, as the WCF includes many of the world's largest chocolate manufacturers, visions of happy workers sustainably producing cheap chocolate to fulfill the world's demand may be a bit of wishful thinking, at least for the time being.

Appearance: Lake Champlain's Five Star bars are all stubby, chunky, and unassuming. This one is mildly reddish-brown and just a little glossy. A cross-section looks like ganache mixed with whitish pecans and not a lot of fruit.

Smell: Sweet dried fruit and nuts, though that might be cheating with this bar. Very pleasant, which is to say nothing pops out.

Taste: The texture in these bars is fatty-creamy, sort of like a less extreme version of a Lindor Truffle (but with actual cocoa butter instead of palm and coconut oils), plus inclusions: Crunchy, low-flavor nuts, dried fruits contributing low-impact complexity and intermittent chew, and a good amount of fatty filling. Since there's hazelnut paste, they're trying for additional flavor and creaminess rather than just nut pieces, and I am getting some minor hints of Nutella that probably add to the fruit/nut vibe. The chocolate feels like an afterthought, but it's really not, because it's well-matched in sweet-tart profile, just not particularly intense.

Conclusion: Lake Champlain Five Star Chocolate Bar Fruit & Nut is an easy, not-so-strong hit of dried fruits, nuts, fat, and pleasant chocolate.

Mast Brothers Chocolate Hazelnuts

2.5oz bar
Ingredients: Cacao, cane sugar, hazelnuts, olive oil  

Last week I reviewed The Brooklyn Blend from Mast Brothers Chocolate, which I learned about during a visit to New York City. This week I'm tasting the other bar I brought back with me, Hazelnuts. Why did I select this one? Since I didn't have a chance to visit the company and taste its wares, I was choosing from among several flavors at a nearby store. I'd just reviewed a bunch of bars involving salt and/or almonds, I'm tired of chocolate that's spicy with no other flavor, and I'm not a huge coffee fan, but I don't get a lot of hazelnuts unless they're in European bars, and then they're usually in some sort of fancy filling. Plain old crushed hazelnuts are surprisingly novel. So there you go.

Corporate Info: (copied from 1/28/12) Mast Brothers is based in hipster-soaked Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and the eponymous brothers do fit the description. The company's website doesn't go into many details about the operation itself, but it does link to articles that describe the process as bean-to-bar and at least partially organic and direct trade. (If you're really interested, follow through on those links to see photos and much more on Mast Brothers.) Reviews seem to be love-it-or-hate-it regarding the taste, prices, and aesthetic of the chocolate, and indeed a lot of the press seems to be related to its uniquely patterned packaging. Mast Brothers' products are available mostly in New York, but also in select high-end food stores around the country.

Appearance: This non-Brooklyn Blend looks different too, a little less ashy and more glossy, less orange and more purple. Neat. Oh, and the back is very prettily covered with crushed hazelnuts.

Smell: Side by side with the Brooklyn Blend, the chocolate in Hazelnuts has less of that earthy (a.k.a. dirt) and green smell and more of a subtle, straightforward fruit thing going on, in the sweet berry direction.

Taste: Fruity, bitter, and tannic—very winey, with all the flavors balanced well. Seriously, it's like drinking a full-bodied red wine here, but with more sugar, and as a total afterthought, I can't taste the hazelnuts under all that. Texture is initially crunchy, then thick and rich, so the hazelnuts don't stand out there either. You'll get no complaints from me since it's nice chocolate and the hazelnuts look lovely on the back, but otherwise I'm not sure why they're there.

Conclusion: Mast Brothers Chocolate Hazelnuts is like eating fruity red wine in quite a nice way, but after you've looked at the pretty hazelnuts on the back, you'll forget about them entirely. Oh, well.

[Update 2/4/12: Since I wrote this, Mast Brothers' website has changed and now I can't find a "where to buy" list that covers brick-and-mortar stores. I'm leaving the link in case they change it back.]

Endangered Species Dark Chocolate with Hazelnut Toffee 72%

3oz (85g) bar

Ingredients: Bittersweet chocolate (chocolate liquor, beet sugar, cocoa butter, soy lecithin, vanilla), hazelnut toffee (butter [cream, salt], beet sugar, roasted hazelnuts, tapioca syrup, soy lecithin)

13g sugar/43g serving (30.2& by wt.)

My favorite candies pre-sugar restriction were Sour Patch Kids and the like, super-sour chewy wads of sugar that I frequently craved and often purchased en masse from pay-by-weight mall candy stores. In the long run, though, the sugar, corn derivatives, and artificial colors and flavors were tangibly empty calories: I would scarf them mechanically until I realized I'd eaten the whole bag, and then I'd feel a bit ill. On the other hand, caramels and toffees, while not my treats of choice, actually satisfied. One or two pieces provided buttery richness and gave my teeth a workout, and I would think, “That was tasty, and I've had enough candy.” Now imagine me in my current state, deprived of creamy sweets, and you're sure to understand why I occasionally pick up Endangered Species' toffee bar. It's usually not expensive and sometimes even on sale, and it slides below my 1/3 sugar limit despite including candy as an ingredient. I appreciate that it's an option.

The inevitable downside of this bar is that it's not all that good. Don't get me wrong, it's not terrible or I'd stop buying it, but it doesn't live up to the name. The chocolate is Endangered Species' usual simple sweetness (I'm starting to wonder if using exclusively beet sugar affects the taste in some way); I keep detecting an odd cooling sensation, like a very subtle mint or menthol; and the toffee is undetectable as fragrance or flavor, its presence limited to the texture of a few small crunchy crystals. And I won't even touch on the promise of hazelnuts.

Conclusion: Endangered Species Dark Chocolate with Hazelnut Toffee 72% conforms to my restrictions and is seductively named, but to my taste it's really just another mediocre Endangered Species bar.